Anyone that has ever appeared with a camera at a union march will know that workers are born actors – as soon as they see your camera, their militancy multiplies, their poses would strain even a gymnast, and their facial expressions leave you with no doubt that they are committed to their cause.
Actions and facial expressions are one thing. Producing a 90-minute play with a cast of close to 50 people that told some stories from Numsa’s rich history is a completely different challenge.
But that is the challenge that eight regions took up at the beginning of the year. As part of the union’s attempt to revive culture, regions were given a limited budget, armed with Kally Forrest’s book – Metal That Will Not Bend – and instructed to choose some memorable event in Numsa’s history in their region and bring it to life on stage.
The cast was limited to six per region, including the director of the play who they could bring in from outside, if necessary.
The NEC agreed to the proposal to bring all these actors to Durban two days before Numsa’s 9th National Congress started.
The two days would be spent polishing and perfecting the play for a discerning and critical audience who would have spent a long first day in the congress before watching the play.
But things never go as smoothly as planned. The Saturday before the congress just happened to coincide with the Comrades Marathon.
This was perfect for one of the actors who planned to practise on Saturday, run the 90km marathon on Sunday and act in the play on Monday night (and he did too!) But for the rest, it meant battling to get flights to Durban on the Saturday so the expected practice could only start late that day.
And then there was the 25 year rally on the Sunday which comrades did not want to miss.
The first rehearsal revealed the shortcomings – one region had hardly practised at all; others could make tea between pauses in their plays; there seemed little link between the different sketches; and the play was nearly three hours long.
There was a lot of work still to be done!
Fortunately we had a young, inspired drama student, Allison Pillay, acting as overall director who found popping bubble wrap the perfect antidote to the stress of coordinating 50 spirited actors.
Directors of each play worked with her to massage and polish the play for its showing.
On Sunday night while other congress delegates were arriving and celebrating, actors worked till the early hours of the morning, going over and over their words and actions – tweaking here and cutting there.
And then it was Monday night … KwaZulu-Natal burst onto the stage with songs that broke the tedium of the day-long speeches.
They were followed by Western Cape, who took us back to the 1970s workplace – a racist boss who saw his workers as nothing more than machines there to do his bidding.
Then the play moved on smoothly to Gauteng actors who recreated the horrors of the Boipatong massacre where about 40 people were killed by IFP supporters on June 17 1992, and then on to the personal sadness of the death of the wife of Numsa organiser David Modimoeng while the battle to fight against the forced removal of Oukasie was on.
Gauteng passed the baton to Eastern Cape, who brought us to 2012 with a mischievous and humorous take on the challenges that our shop stewards face now.
Northern Cape closed the spectacle reminding us of our leaders and of key policies that we have committed ourselves to fight for so as to improve the lives of the working class.
Source
Numsa News